


a life from a new perspective

by CycloneRachel



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Introspection, Minor Kara Danvers, One Shot, Post-Supergirl (TV 2015) Season 5, Season 5 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:49:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27128815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CycloneRachel/pseuds/CycloneRachel
Summary: prompt from tumblr user peskyshortcake: "Brainy while still healing, thinking that he won't be invited over for Thanksgiving. So the SuperFriends bring Thanksgiving to him."
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	a life from a new perspective

**Author's Note:**

> wow. so this is my 100th Supergirl fic on here, huh?
> 
> (100th not including the anthology fics I've posted, of course)
> 
> But anyway! I tried to get this done last week, as it was Canadian Thanksgiving and I didn't want to wait so long to actually write this. But that didn't happen, so I ended up finishing it tonight (and I hope it's good)

Querl knew the odds.

Of course he did- he’d calculated them at the beginning of his partnership with Lex, and by the time he reported them to one of his doppelgangers, they’d risen from even that initial number.

_“There is a 93.2% probability that none will invite me to Thanksgiving... after I do what must be done.”_

The other version of him advised to trust the math, and his friends, as both of them were strong enough to work without his interference as he continued to work with Lex. And there was no reason for Querl not to trust his doppelganger- after all, since he had gone through these events just as the female version of himself had (and he’d experienced their failures through their eyes, after they gave him their life projectors), his advice was perhaps the most trustworthy.

It was certainly better than anything Lex would tell him.

That, along with the time he’d gotten to speak with Winn, the memory of Winn’s hand on his arm as he reminded Querl he trusted him (after the ordeal Querl had put him through), and the advice from his female doppelganger, motivated him as he moved forward. Those memories were his sole companions during his time alongside Lex, the only things he could truly count on as he continued living a lie.

He worked with the others, as he had technically before he was uninhibited, but things had shifted- he was now the DEO director, the person everyone else looked to for answers. Supergirl, in a way, had worked for him, even if he felt distant from her (more than he had before), and every moment he didn’t spend running the DEO was spent with Lex, or calculating what he had to say and do while he was with him.

Even for him, it was exhausting, and soon he felt as though he were being slowly torn apart by all that he had to do, every responsibility taking from him and giving back in return no rest, no time to relax or recover. It was no wonder that there were things he overlooked, mistakes that piled up on one another, and the exhaustion he felt overwhelmed him enough that Lex could see it in his eyes, and know how much of an advantage he had in that moment.

It was just as inevitable, then, that when he did triumph, he also wouldn’t be able to celebrate it for long.

(He remembered holding a bottled world for the first time, how cold the bottle was as he looked down on the planet his mother had captured for him. He’d wished he could go back into the snow, play in it without fear of being judged by anyone. Out there, where everything felt wiped clean, he nearly forgot he was a Brainiac, and that his parents were watching him.)

(He was certainly aware of it afterwards.)

And, once he woke up- finding himself with (even for him) almost too much time to think about what had happened in the past few months, he found it difficult not to go back to his memories of his time spent working with Lex, and reassess them- constantly criticizing himself, considering alternate scenarios and what he should have done better, ways that he could have avoided near-death and appearing as though he betrayed everyone he knew and cared about.

But he couldn’t go back and change the past, even if he had access to his Time Bubble, so he only moved forward, and continued healing.

So several months after what had happened, Querl accessed his internal calendar, and found that it was close to Thanksgiving- the same holiday that he had told his other self that he wouldn’t be invited to, and couldn’t partake in that year. It was a uniquely twenty-first century holiday, though its origins extended back further, and although its origin was problematic, as some might have said, Kara still expressed a specific fondness for it.

(Which was no surprise, as it combined two of Kara’s favorite things- family togetherness, and- of course-food)

He’d experienced two Thanksgivings, since his arrival- the first occurring at a time when the Children of Liberty were seeking to divide people, and thus it was all the more important to come together and celebrate one’s differences, sharing a meal together as any family would. That was Kara’s intention that year, hosting the dinner at her apartment, with humans and aliens from multiple planets at the same table. Naturally, one such as Benjamin Lockwood refused to see the motive behind such a thing, but it was important nonetheless, and even though Querl’s mind was occupied by work (and the thought of his mother- how she would have reacted, as he was seated beside Supergirl especially, and earlier had brought her flowers), he still at least tried to enjoy the event as it had been presented.

The second, in contrast, was much more subdued- it occurred after Kara was recovered from the Fortress of Solitude, after Lena had trapped her there with Kryptonite. She had sought to, in a way, unite everyone- in contrast with Lockwood, but in line with Non and Indigo before her, even using the same device and Myriad program that they had. But Querl knew, both from the time she had invaded his mind a few weeks prior and from having studied Myriad when he first looked through Kara’s years as Supergirl, that implementing such a device would only cause harm, ignoring the definition of humanity in favor of overriding their code, making them follow specific directives.

(He only wished he could have communicated that with Lena herself, but- even after becoming uninhibited- he struggled to find the words, and the time to do so)

So it was a smaller group that met at Kara’s apartment that Thanksgiving- minus Lena and Manchester and James, but with the addition of Kelly. Querl brought flowers again, as well as pie, and had hoped that it was enough.

(If he did the same this year, he feared that it certainly wouldn’t be.)

(Then again, he had long since accepted it, and thus there was no reason to fear this exclusion as it was an understandable and expected thing.)

What he hadn’t expected, once Thanksgiving day arrived, was Kara arriving at his apartment, carrying flowers for him along with what she’d told him was Eliza Danvers’s famous pie. And with her came the rest of their little group- even Kara’s biological mother, Alura, had left Argo to visit, although Alura and Querl had never spoken to one another. They brought food as well, and soon Querl had a small mountain of leftovers on his table.

“We decided to bring Thanksgiving to you.” Kara said, when he asked her why she’d done it. “You’ve done so much- you deserve to rest, and enjoy something at least for today.”

“So… you forgive me?”

“I forgave you when you sacrificed everything for us.” Kara said. “And I would have done it no matter what. You expected nothing back- but you made the hardest choices. How could I not, after I’ve had to do the same thing?”

He got up to hug her, and when he sat back down, it was with a whole plate in his hands, and a new sensation of lightness in his heart, seeing how those around him agreed with Kara, as they sat and ate with them both.

(It felt, almost more than any other time during this century, as though they were truly Querl’s family- and it was better than any verbal invitation.)


End file.
